Reform is the buzzword in public schools today. Faced with a student population that needs more help and the public's demand for higher quality, schools are trying new methods of teaching and recreating the look, feel and daily pace of the classroom. It can be a bewildering process for parents. This package of stories hopes to take the mystery out of some of the leading reform efforts under way in the Los Angeles area.

The Los Angeles teachers' union and a group of parents are challenging a proposed settlement to a landmark lawsuit against the Los Angeles Unified School District, contending that the agreement would unfairly penalize teachers and hurt middle-class schools.

Nearly six years after the legal wrangling began, attorneys for the Los Angeles Unified School District and a group of parents said Tuesday they have removed the last stumbling blocks to settling a lawsuit that charges the district with perpetuating inequities between campuses in middle-class and poor neighborhoods.

Their eyes are on the prize, a victory Sunday in the national academic decathlon. But to their amusement--and sometimes their amazement--the students from El Camino Real High School in Woodland Hills have noticed plenty of eyes on them. "Everyone knows you're one of the top teams and looks at you," said El Camino senior Brian Lazarus, 18. "As soon as they hear that we're from California, they get all serious."

Their eyes are on the prize--a victory Sunday in the national academic decathlon. But to their amusement, and sometimes their amazement, the students from El Camino Real High School in Woodland Hills have noticed plenty of eyes on them. "Everyone knows you're one of the top teams and looks at you," said El Camino senior Brian Lazarus, 18. "As soon as they hear that we're from California, they get all serious."

A private, two-hour meeting before a state mediator Thursday failed to bring the Los Angeles school district and teachers union negotiators closer to an agreement, as both sides fired more legal salvos in an increasingly contentious labor dispute. The session came one week after a Los Angeles Superior Court judge ruled that the district and union must wage their legal battles before a state labor relations agency that is legally empowered to enforce labor laws applying to school districts.

State Senate leader David A. Roberti, who has vowed to break up the mammoth Los Angeles Unified School District, opened his political offensive Wednesday by releasing a hastily written state report that claims the district cannot account for nearly 20% of its $400-million budget deficit. School officials immediately blasted the report as "slipshod" and misleading.

The leaders of United Teachers-Los Angeles voted Monday to recommend that teachers reject the Los Angeles school board's final contract offer and go on strike Feb. 22, at the start of the spring semester. The district's 35,000 teachers, nurses, counselors and librarians will vote next week on whether to follow the recommendation and walk out, or accept the proposed contract, which would bring teacher pay cuts to a total of 12%.

Environmental activists made an unsuccessful attempt Monday to channel $50,000, from the millions spent by teen-agers on miniature golf and video games in the Sepulveda Basin, to a program to teach the youths about nature in the basin. By a 3-0 vote, the Los Angeles Board of Recreation and Park Commissioners voted to seek new bids to run the entertainment concession in the basin's city park, which brings in $3 million a year to the present operator.

The State Board of Education will convene an unprecedented meeting in Sacramento today to decide if an emergency situation exists in the Los Angeles Unified School District that warrants the waiver of several state education codes, a move that could bolster the district's chances in court of imposing teacher pay cuts. The 10-member state board, which is scheduled to meet at 10 a.m., has never gathered over an emergency request, officials said.